Intonation analysis of Carnatic violín performances in Thodi and Kalyani

This thesis explores the intonation characteristics of Carnatic violin performances, focusing on the ragas Thodi and Kalyani. The study aims to address the gap in research on violin intonation in Carnatic music, which has previously primarily concentrated on vocal intonation and sustained pitch notes. Utilizing existing pitch tracking algorithms and statistical analysis, this research investigates Carnatic violín intonation within these specific ragas, focusing on 1) its alignment with the 22-Sruti tuning system, 2) specific intonation characteristics of individual swaras, and 3) statistical comparisons with vocal intonation. The methodology involves selecting tracks from the Saraga Carnatic dataset, extracting predominant pitch contours using the Melodia algorithm, and processing these contours to compute pitch histograms and kernel density estimates (KDEs). Peak parameters have been derived from these distributions to investigate specific swara-based intonation against known musicological insights. Statistical tests, including t-tests, U-tests and cross-entropy measurements, have been performed to compare pitch distributions across different sections of the performances and between vocal and violin tracks. The findings highlight both swara-wise and overall intonation differences between violin and vocal performances. The violin shows sharper, more focused peaks in the pitch distributions, whereas the vocals exhibit broader, noisier peaks. Swara-wise results reveal that the intonation generally aligns with musicological expectations for both raagas, however there is a discrepancy in the rendering of Suddha Dhaivatham (D1) in Thodi and Kaakali Nishadham (N3) in Kalyani between the violin and vocals. In raga-wise statistical comparisons, Thodi demonstrates greater variability in violin intonation, while Kalyani shows more consistency, likely due to Thodi’s expressive playing style with wider oscillations. Section-wise statistical tests reveal that the intonation remains relatively consistent between the violin’s main and alaapana sections but diverges in the solo section, suggesting that vocal accompaniment in the main and alaapana sections influences the violin, while the solo sections allow for a more independent performance style. These results contribute to a deeper understanding of the expressive nuances in Carnatic violin performances and suggest potential directions for future research in both musicology and computational music analysis.